Unknown (Diego Hargreeves x Reader)

11

Diego approached his humming mother apprehensively, knowing he may regret his next conversation.

"Mom, we need to talk." Diego said, his eyes fixed firmly on the ground.
"Okay, but only for a minute. I need to finish this cross-stitch."
"Everything you did for use when we were kids... For me... Why'd you do it?" he asked.

Grace turned towards Diego and smiled widely, "Because being your mother is the greatest gift of my life."
"Is that you saying that?" Diego asked, stepping towards his mother, staring at her eyes.
"I'm not sure what you mean, Diego."
"I mean, our father, he... made you. When you think something, is it like he's telling you what to say?"
"Your father isn't here, silly." Grace brushed off his question.

Diego stood rigid, being left perplexed as he expected the worst answer.

"Did I do something wrong?" Grace asked.
"No, it's... It's not... Look," he said, kneeling beside her, "It's okay, if you hated him. He was terrible to you, to all of us"
"Don't say that."
"We were just tools in an experiment to him. Nothing more." Diego said as he holds his mother's gaze, "So I'm saying, I would understand if..." he glanced around the room, "You know, if... If you wanted to hurt him."

Grace leaned towards Diego and smiled, "Now, now. Mr. Hargreeves was a great man. Industrialist, inventor, Olympic gold medallist. He made the world a better place."

She stood, fixated on the paintings in front of her. Diego rose with his mother, his building anger expelled from him as he did.

"Stop it!" he grabbed her shoulders and shook her slightly, "Do you hear me? Stop trying to defend him!"

He took a breath and continued, "Mom, you gotta feel something. Look, he treated you worse than anyone. You worked for him for 30 years. He didn't even give you a room to sleep in."

Grace seemed sincere in her look of consideration but it flickered back into her transfixion on the paintings.

"But I've got such beautiful views here."
"Mom, those are just paintings."
Grace laughed, "Of course they are."

She stared at the paintings, in particular one of a woman sat in a chair, a long necklace hanging from her neck.

"What a wonderful world she lives in," she grinned, "Sometimes I wonder if she's lonely."

Diego's face fell as he walked silently away from his dear mother. He had begun to pace the halls, wandering aimlessly through the maze of the academy. Unaware of the strange visitors that were roaming their rooms armed with machine guns and their disturbing masks.

He came to a stairwell, pausing as he notices something in his peripheral vision. Two grotesque masks, a frightening blue bear and a distressing pink dog. Diego stood static as he turned his head towards the two intruders as they raised their weapons and cocked them.

Gunshots rang through the building, Diego whipped two knives at their masks, temporarily incapacitating them. The remaining, living, sober members of the Umbrella Academy rushed towards the deafening shots as Diego pushed his back against the wall as he narrowly missed the bullets. The taller of the pair stomped down the hall, Diego surged forward, punching the gun down and attempting to headbutt the masked attacker. A clunk of metal sounded as Diego stumbled back slightly dazed.

"Cha-Cha, shoot him."
"Get out of the way, dumbass."

Diego sped down the adjacent hallway, running through the building along the landing. He threw himself over the balcony, tumbling over the couch, barely dodging the bullets. Scrambling backwards, Diego leant against a table as he briefly looked upwards at the portrait of his father, newly decorated with seven bullet holes.